If you think video games are engrossing now, just wait: PlayStation maker Sony Corp (SNE.N). has been granted a patent for beaming sensory information directly into the brain.
The U.S. patent, granted to Sony researcher Thomas Dawson, describes a technique for aiming ultrasonic pulses at specific areas of the brain to induce “sensory experiences” such as smells, sounds and images.
“The pulsed ultrasonic signal alters the neural timing in the cortex,” the patent states. “No invasive surgery is needed to assist a person, such as a blind person, to view live and/or recorded images or hear sounds.”
A Sony Electronics spokeswoman told the magazine that no experiments had been conducted, and that the patent “was based on an inspiration that this may someday be the direction that technology will take us.”
To me this sounds more like a marketing ploy to get the public to buy more of Sony’s next-generation gaming consoles and PSPs.
Source: Reuters
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